Here it is — the sixth & final installment of the DHP History of Irregular Warfare series with Bill Buppert.

Join CJ & Bill as they discuss:

• Circumstances in which insurgents do or do not have the moral high ground
• The impact of technologies on insurgency & 4GW
• The importance of narrative
• Alleged “best practices” for counterinsurgency (or COIN)
• Links between the rise of the modern state and the proliferation of resistance to it
• Lessons to be learned from insurgencies, even for those who never plan on physically fighting the state
• Thoughts on methods of defense against external threats for a stateless society
• The Tamil Tigers in Sri Lanka & why they failed
• Tying things back into the trifecta of narrative, legitimacy, and grievances

Support the DHP via Patreon

External Links

• ZeroGov, Bill’s website
• Part 1 of the series on Stoicism that Bill did last year with Brett Veinotte on the School Sucks Podcast
• Creamy Radio Audio (mentioned by Bill during the show, and which both of us recommend for podcasters looking to improve their audio quality)
• Rand Corporation Study on counterinsurgency
• Malcolm Gladwell, “The Strange Tale of the Norden Bombsight”
• Malcolm Gladwell, “David and Goliath”
• Leeroy Jenkins  (in case you’re not familiar with that long-ago viral Youtube video that I sampled for the intro)

Internal Links

• Ep. 0055: Save Yourself (episode in which I discuss the story of Xenophon & the Ten Thousand)
• Ep. 0077: History of Irregular Warfare with Bill Buppert (part 1)
• Ep. 0078: History of Irregular Warfare with Bill Buppert (part 2)
• Ep. 0079: History of Irregular Warfare with Bill Buppert (part 3)
• Ep. 0080: History of Irregular Warfare with Bill Buppert (part 4)
• Ep. 0081: History of Irregular Warfare with Bill Buppert (part 5)

Join CJ & Bill as they discuss:

• Key factors that cause insurgencies to succeed or fail
• The importance of external help to guerrillas and insurgents
• The effects of terrain (including urban terrain) on irregular warfare
• Circumstances under which guerrillas and insurgents have or do not have an advantage

Support the show via Patreon

Internal Links

• Ep. 0077: A History of Irregular Warfare with Bill Buppert (part 1)
• Ep. 0078: A History of Irregular Warfare with Bill Buppert (part 2)
• Ep. 0079: A History of Irregular Warfare with Bill Buppert (part 3)
• Ep. 0080: A History of Irregular Warfare with Bill Buppert (part 4)

External Links

• ZeroGov, Bill’s website
• The Rand Corporation study  on counterinsurgency that Bill mentioned in the show

Join CJ & Bill as they discuss:

• Some of the post-WWII wars of ‘decolonization’ the British & French fought in places like Malaya, Kenya, & Algeria
• Vietnam, comparing the French performance there in the 19th century to the French & American performance there in the mid-20th century
• Some thoughts on the recent wars in the Middle East and Southwest Asia

Support the Dangerous History Podcast via Patreon

Internal Links

• Ep. 0077: History of Irregular Warfare with Bill Buppert (Part 1)
• Ep. 0078: History of Irregular Warfare with Bill Buppert (Part 2)
• Ep. 0079: History of Irregular Warfare with Bill Buppert (Part 3)

External Links

• ZeroGov.com, Bill’s website

Join CJ & Bill as they discuss:

• Col. T.E. Lawrence’s operations in Arabia during the First World War
• The Anglo-Irish War and its primary mastermind, Michael Collins
• The concept of “peak guerrilla” or “peak G” in the West in the years 1916-1922
• Mao Tse Tung as theorist and practitioner of guerrilla warfare in the Chinese Civil War

Support the show via Patreon

Internal Links

• Ep. 0077: History of Irregular Warfare with Bill Buppert (Part 1)
• Ep. 0078: History of Irregular Warfare with Bill Buppert (Part 2)
• Ep. 0068:  71: A Dangerous History Movie Review

External Links

• ZeroGov.com, Bill’s Website
• “The Other Fight: Understanding Conventional Warfare” by Bill Buppert
• “Double Blind: The Untold Story of How British Intelligence Infiltrated and Undermined the IRA,” by Matthew Teague
• Jallianwala Bagh massacre (aka, Amritsar)
• The Young Dubliners’ version of “The Foggy Dew,” clips of which were the bumper music of this episode

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Join CJ & Bill as they discuss:

• The 1807-1814 Peninsular War in Spain during the Napoleonic era (with a few remarks about the potential effectiveness of fighters with no prior military background, and some examples of this from the American Revolutionary War)
• Confederate partisans, ‘rangers’ and some of their precursors in the Kansas & Missouri violence of the 1850s
• The Anglo-Boer Wars in South Africa in the late-nineteenth and early-twentieth century
• The little-known but astonishing campaign of Paul von Lettow-Vorbeck in East Africa during World War I

Support the show via Patreon

Internal Links

• Ep. 0077: History of Irregular Warfare with Bill Buppert (Part 1)

External Links

• ZeroGov, Bill’s website
• “The Other Fight: Understanding Conventional Warfare” by Bill Buppert
• “Come Out You Black & Tans” as performed by Paddy Reilly (the intro music for this episode)

(Featured image for this episode is of the guns Paul von Lettow-Vorbeck scavenged from the ship Konigsberg & then used on land in his African campaign; Attribution: Bundesarchiv, Bild 105-DOA3100 / Walther Dobbertin / CC-BY-SA 3.0 [CC BY-SA 3.0 de (http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-sa/3.0/de/deed.en)], via Wikimedia Commons)

This episode is the first part of my conversation with Bill Buppert on the history of irregular warfare.

Bill Buppert is a retired Army officer. He has been a writer for a number of publications including lewrockwell.com. He is particularly interested in the issues of liberty, survival, shooting and history. He has made frequent media appearances. He wishes to continue the abolitionist project of men like William Wilberforce and Lysander Spooner.  A recognized authority on irregular and guerrilla warfare, he is the founder and publisher of zerogov.com.

Join CJ & Bill as they discuss:

• The 4 Generations of Modern War
• The meaning of terms such as irregular warfare, guerrilla warfare, terrorism, and insurgency
• The concept of counterinsurgency, or COIN
• The earliest manifestations of irregular warfare in human history (or prehistory)

Support the show via Patreon

External Links

• ZeroGov, Bill Buppert’s website
• “The Other Fight: Understanding Conventional Warfare” by Bill Buppert
• “Generations of War in the New Century” by Bill Buppert
• “The Changing Face of War: Into the Fourth Generation,” by William S. Lind, et.al. (first published in the Oct. 1989 issue of the Marine Corps Gazette)
• “Understanding Fourth Generation War” by William S. Lind (antiwar.com, Jan. 2004)

For this DHP episode, CJ was delighted to be joined by retired Army officer, military contractor, and irregular warfare expert Bill Buppert. Long-time DHP listeners (& those who’ve gone through the back catalogue) may recall that Bill was the very first guest CJ ever had on the DHP, all the way back in 2015. A few months ago, Bill launched a podcast of his own, Chasing Ghosts, in which he covers the history, theory & practice of irregular warfare, and the shortcomings of its alleged antidote, counterinsurgency.

Join CJ & Bill as they discuss Bill’s background, his podcast, irregular warfare, the problems with counterinsurgency, and 3 of the greatest practitioners of irregular warfare in the 20th century – Michael Collins, T.E. Lawrence, & Paul Von Lettow-Vorbeck, who all operated c. 1916-1922.

Kick in to CJ’s Indiegogo campaign!

Support the Dangerous History Podcast via Patreon or SubscribeStar!

Links

• Chasing Ghosts (Bill’s irregular warfare podcast)
• The Dash (Bill’s just-launched Stoicism podcast)
• Follow Bill on Twitter
• DHP Ep. 77: History of Irregular Warfare with Bill Buppert, Part 1 (This is part 1 of what ended up being 6 installments of CJ’s conversations with Bill all the way back in 2015, with Bill speaking with CJ over Skype from Afghanistan. The remainder of this series is comprised of DHP Eps. 78-81 & 83.)